'Bin Laden Still Alive'

Al-Qaida's leader, Osama bin Laden, is alive and well and leading the holy war against the west, the terrorist group's second-in-command reportedly said in a videotape broadcast today.

The tape, purportedly by Ayman al-Zawahri, was shown by the pan-Arab television channel al-Jazeera. It also included a call for attacks on oil installations.

If it proves to be genuine, the broadcast is the first confirmation in a year from a top al-Qaida official that Bin Laden is still alive, despite rumours that he died or was wounded in the October earthquake in Kashmir, which killed 79,000 people.

"Thanks be to God, [al-Qaida's] prince, Sheik Osama bin Laden, is still, God protect him, leading the holy war," Zawahri says in the videotape.

"I call on mujahideen to concentrate their attacks on Muslims' stolen oil, most of the revenues of which go to the enemies of Islam while most of what they leave is seized by the thieves who rule our countries," he said.

References to Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak's re-election in September indicated the footage was filmed some time after that.

The video showed Zawahri speaking against a white background to an interviewer off-camera who said the interview was to mark the fourth anniversary of the September 11 2001 attacks in the United States.

In the tape, which was posted on an Islamic website known for carrying statements from extremist groups, he called on Iraqi insurgent groups to unite. Iraqi Arabs, Kurds and Turkomans, "whose hands were not tainted by Americans" should come together to fill "the gap that will be left by the Americans' departure" from Iraq, he said.